For some reason, all of the day care workers went by the title of “Miss.” Only twenty and still a college student, the young woman looked as if she was near to tears herself, while Miss Dabney, the day care director, hovered anxiously at her shoulder.
Tall and whipcord-lean, Kendal Oakes looked not only agonized but also out of place in his pin-striped suit and red silk tie tossed back haphazardly over one shoulder. One thick lock of his rich nut-brown hair had fallen forward to curl against his brow, and the shadow of his beard darkened his long jawline and flat cheeks. He was speaking to his daughter in a somewhat-exasperated voice.
“Larissa, please listen. Listen a minute. Daddy is taking you to play with Dr. Stenhope. You like Dr. Stenhope. Larissa, Dr. Stenhope is waiting for us. Come on now.”
“Is she ill?” Connie wondered aloud, and for one heartbeat, everything froze.
All heads turned in her direction and Larissa stopped screaming long enough to see that someone new had arrived. The next instant, the child propelled herself out of her caregiver’s arms and straight into Connie’s, clapping her hands around Connie’s neck and grasping handfuls of Connie’s hair and coat.
Grappling with the sudden weight of a flying body, slight as it was, Connie staggered slightly. Larissa lay her head on Connie’s shoulder and sobbed inconsolably. The sound of it tore at Connie’s heart, and by the look in his cinnamon-brown eyes, it ripped Kendal Oakes to shreds.
For a moment, Connie saw such despair in those eyes that she mentally recoiled. She knew despair too well to wish further acquaintance with it.
The next instant, compassion rushed in. The poor man.
“I’m so sorry,” he said, but she shook her head and instinctively stepped back as he reached for his daughter.
Connie noticed that he had quite large hands, with wide palms and long, tapered fingers.
“It’s all right,” she told him softly, hefting the child more securely against her.
Larissa felt warm, her tiny chest heaving, but whether it was with exertion or fever, Connie couldn’t tell.
“Has anyone been able to take her temperature?”
Kendal shook his head grimly. “It’s not a physical ailment. Dr. Stenhope is a pediatric psychiatrist.”
Poor baby, Connie thought, rocking from side to side in a gentle swinging motion. Connie knew that the child had to be under two; otherwise, she would have been in a different class than Russell. So young and already under the care of a psychiatrist. It was heartbreaking.
Larissa’s weeping subsided to huffs and gasps. Connie reached up and instinctively patted the child’s back. Kendal stared at her hand as if he was studying just how she did it. He betrayed a patent desire to learn how to handle his daughter, and once more Connie’s heart went out to him.
After a moment, he glanced reluctantly at the thin gold watch encircling his wrist and grimaced.
“We really have to go.”
Cautiously, almost apologetically, he reached for his daughter, but as those big hands settled at her heaving sides, Larissa shrieked and arched her back, clutching on tighter to Connie. The one clearly in pain, though, was Kendal. Leaning closer, he pitched his voice low and spoke to the bucking child.
“Larissa, we have to go. Dr. Stenhope is waiting for us. Don’t you want to see Dr. Stenhope?”
What Larissa wanted was to hang around Connie’s neck like a necklace, and she fought for several moments, shrugging and twisting and clutching. Her father patted and cajoled and stroked, but Larissa screamed and flailed in sheer anger. Finally Kendal grasped her firmly by the sides and pulled her away from Connie.
“I am so sorry. She misses her mother still. She…” He gave up trying to speak over Larissa’s shrieks, turned her chest to his and gulped. “I’m sorry,” he said again before striding down the hallway, Larissa’s head clasped to his shoulder to keep her from hurting herself as she bucked.
“You don’t suppose…” Miss Susan murmured, breaking off before completing the thought.
Connie glanced at her, sensing what she was thinking, what they were both thinking, Miss Susan and Miss Dabney.
“No,” she said firmly. “I don’t believe he would harm that child.”
It seemed a logical conclusion, Connie had to admit, but she’d seen child abusers up close and personal during her many years as a foster child. She’d seen the children come in, battered in body and spirit, and watched as the state tried to retrain the parent and reunite the family. If the abuse had been mild enough in nature and the parent willing to work at it, the outcome had sometimes been good. Too often, it had not. More than once, a child of her acquaintance had died after reunification.
Everything she knew told her that the worst that could be said about Kendal Oakes was that he might not be a very skilled parent, but he was obviously trying to get help. It occurred to her that she might have handled this situation better herself.
“Miss Susan, would you get Russell ready to leave, please? I won’t be a moment,” she said crisply, turning to follow Kendal down the hall.
He was moving quickly and she had to run to catch up, but she was with him when they reached his car. He fumbled in his pocket for his keys. Larissa wailed, but she no longer struggled. When he had the keys in hand, he pressed the tiny button on the remote that unlocked the doors.
“Here, let me get that,” Connie offered, reaching for the door handle.
She pulled it open and stepped aside as Kendal bent down, clutching Larissa firmly. He deposited the child in her car seat, but when he attempted to pull the straps of the safety harness up over her shoulders, she crossed her arms and kicked him. He jerked back but said nothing, caught both of her feet in one hand and held them down as he reached for the harness straps with the other. Obviously, he wasn’t going to get it done with one hand.
“Can I help?” Connie asked.
“Would you mind?”
She heard the cringing in his voice, the shame at what he perceived to be his personal failure.
“Not at all,” Connie said brightly, squeezing into the open space beside him.
Larissa stopped crying the instant Connie drew near and allowed her to gently uncross her arms so her father could slide the harness straps in place and bring them together over her chest. Connie smiled and attempted to keep the child engaged while he fit together the two sections of the restraint system and pushed them into the lock.
“There now. That’s right,” Connie crooned. Larissa watched her avidly, as if she was memorizing her face. “What a pretty girl you are when you aren’t crying.” She stroked her hand over the child’s pale-blond hair and heard the lock click at last. “All ready to go see the doctor?”
Larissa blinked and jabbed two fingers into her mouth. Her nose was running, so Connie dug into her coat pocket for a tissue. She had second thoughts before she touched the tissue to that tiny nose, but Larissa turned up her chin and closed her eyes while Connie gently cleaned her nose. But then Connie pocketed the tissue once more and backed away. Larissa’s eyes popped open and she howled like a banshee, drumming her heels and reaching toward Connie.
Dismayed, Connie could only watch as Kendal closed the door on his daughter’s howls of protest.
“Oh, dear.”
“It’s all right,” he said, two bright red splotches staining the flesh drawn tight over his cheekbones. “When she gets like this…” He clutched his keys. “She’ll calm down in a few minutes. She likes Dr. Stenhope, I think.”
Connie couldn’t control her